Create a New Tomorrow

EP 50: Embracing Technologies and Integrations in Society with Steve Prentice - Full Episode


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Hi, I am here with Steve Prentice, He is a professional speaker, published author, writer, journalist, project manager, university lecturer, and consultant, who helps people, businesses, and technology understand each other. he wears a few hats, but ultimately it's all about communicating and implementing the ideas, plans, and skills that are vital for surviving and thriving in a quickly changing world.


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Ari Gronich 0:00  

I'm Ari Gronich, and this is create a new tomorrow podcast.

Welcome back to another episode of create a new tomorrow I am your host, Ari Gronich. Remember to like subscribe, rate review, comment below. Anything that you have to say good, bad, indifferent, we want to have the conversations. That's the whole important point. Let's have these conversations that created a new tomorrow today and move our country forward so we can activate our vision for a better world. Today, I have with me, Steve Prentice. Steve is, you know, he works in the space where people and technology collide. He's got degrees in organizational psychology and journalism. And he focuses on the way humans work with our in spite of technological advances to help companies become more pragmatic in their usage. Steve, why don't you tell us a little bit about your your history and what got you and interested in what you're doing and, and how you became you.


Steve Prentice 1:22  

I just love technology. And I love what it can do. My father was an engineer. And even though I'm not, I still have that desire to see how things work, take them apart and bring them back together again. So when I was trying to find work as a student in university, I got a temp job. And this was in the days when dos based computers with a thing before windows before the internet. And what I noticed was that people were having trouble with things such as the F keys on the keyboard, it sounds very arbitrary right now. But what those F keys mean. And if you go back, if you're as old as I am, you can remember when dealing with things like WordPerfect, these these programs, before Microsoft became the ruler of everything. In order to print a document, you have to memorize this combination of things, it's actually Shift F seven and one in case anybody's checking. But the fact is, this is totally not a human thing. This is an engineering thing. And people got stuck on this, and people had to get training courses on how to use technology. And I thought, well, you know, this is not really what it should be about, there should be some sort of intuitive way that we can get together with our technology. And to this day, that hasn't fully happened. And it's not blaming engineers at all, but there's just always a disconnect between those who create the technologies and those who have to use them. So I've created kind of a style and an ability to speak, to write, to teach and also to consult organizations, including for some very large, you know, huge, well known high tech firms on how to explain their technologies, you know, how to take concepts like artificial intelligence or facial recognition away from being simply a technological cool thing. A factoring in the fear people may have about these technologies, identity, privacy, or even job loss, and saying, How can we make these things mixed together? And that's, that's really what I've been doing now for almost 30 years. And it just keeps on happening. And I just love it.


Ari Gronich 3:17  

Well, yeah, I happen to be old enough to remember WordPerfect wordstar. You know, writing code in basic, and then DOS and Harvard graphics. What was that


Steve Prentice 3:33  

Harvard graphics? That PowerPoint?


Ari Gronich 3:36  

Yes. You know, trying to create a game like Pong right? Back in, in the days of, of the old green and orange monitors, things. That's actually while I was going to school, one of the things that I did is I used to repair old 286 sX computers, the ones that are massively huge and heavy. And for some reason, I had a ability to figure out having not known much at the time, which jumper was out of place and which one needed to be put back into place. But these days, I'll tell you the truth, my my technological prowess has been depleted into almost nothingness. And technology is moving at such a an exponential rate, that it makes it difficult for my old foggy brain to to learn a new trick. So, you know, why don't you kind of give us a little bit about this current side of technology, and maybe some ways either that people can understand it, and actually do it. Because for me, like I understand the concepts of what they say too. Do but the technology and the integrations and the minutiae are so unique, that I find that I think that a lot of people are having trouble reaching their goals simply because of the technology that they don't know how to use rather than not having products or services that are valuable and worthy of people finding out about them.


Steve Prentice 5:23  

Absolutely. I mean, here's, here's number one, we've we've been going through extremely tough year, we're not out of the woods yet with regards to everything going on. And one of the major offshoots, aside from the tragedy of this year is job losses, and just people who have had real trouble just keeping afloat because of the changes in commerce. Now, one thing that I do say, and I was saying this, even before the COVID thing happened, was, there's never been a better time to be at work right now. But there's also never been a better time to be out of work. And that sounds like a cynical statement, but it's not intended to be. What I'm saying here is that there's never been a better time to find new work. And the mindset, you were talking about the old foggy brain a moment ago, and the mindset from, let's say, a couple of decades ago, with regards to what a job was, and what a career was, was largely focused on maybe staying with the same job for your entire career, staying employable within a company, we're now moving into an era where people of all ages are much more aware of their career mobility, we have the technologies, you know, the job sites, the websites, and the simple networking capacity for people to do so much more with themselves in terms of what they would like to do rather than what they think they should do. So it doesn't mean that it's easy, as you know, just a simple little thing. But it does mean that it's eminently possible for people to maintain their careers, move on to other jobs, take the non transferable skills that they have learned, and market themselves. We've seen job sites getting more intelligent over the years, matching people up with jobs and recruiters and so forth. But we've also got things like LinkedIn, which are largely underused, because people don't quite understand how to use LinkedIn. Everyone's sort of opened up a profile, they're stuck their resume there, and nothing really happened. But this is an example of a tool that can be used extremely proactively in the the art and science and magic of career self fulfillment. What I mean, for example, is you could go on and what I recommend to people to do always two key rules about LinkedIn. And there's no other platform that is similar to them to this for this opportunity for us. Number one is to make sure you have a great profile that describes you, what you do, what you can do what you have done, perhaps with a couple of endorsements from past managers, employers or customers, and to have a picture of yourself, I mean, I recommend some people may not want to do that for personal security reasons. But aside from that, you know, if you can put your picture up, you're immediately now connecting with people on the emotional and instinctive level, which is what my you know, my sort of primary focus of work is, I doesn't matter what you look like, it's just that I want to have a face that I can relate to. And this is where trust starts, when I can, I can see who I'm dealing with. So we're having a, a place on LinkedIn, that is you that is step number one. And step number two, is as you build your group of people, your contacts, and they're not accepting just anybody who asks to join, but the pedigree of your contacts based on people that you would recommend and trust, and you know them and respect them professionally. Once a day, once a day, you go on to LinkedIn, and you just see what LinkedIn tells you about your contacts who's celebrating a work anniversary today, who has just got a new job who has posted an Instagram in an article and just say, hey, congratulations, well done. Thumbs up. Because what you're doing when you do that, is you are warming your the memory of you in their minds and hearts and you are building what is the most significant and important asset to your career, which is your network, it doesn't mean that individual is going to hire you, per se, or you don't sort of say, hey, happy birthday, oh, by the way, please hire me or please buy my product, you just build a network. And this network is responsible for finding new opportunities for giving you references or leads. And also you can do the same for them. So all I'm saying is that back in the day before the LinkedIn existed, I would have been talking about this with regards to business card Rolodex is a collection of business cards that just having 10,000 business cards does not make you well connected, you're much better connected with a little black book of 100 names than a box of 1000 business cards. So in this era, the active and the proactive dynamic and artificially intelligent Lee enhanced concepts behind LinkedIn and I don't work for them by the way, I just simply saying this is what they can do for you is to further your connections in the world and open up those opportunities. So it doesn't matter how old you are. There's never been a better time to be looking for work. And I described this about myself. All the time, for 30 years I have been looking for work. problem is I keep finding it. And I find it because I just always keep in touch with the people who can refer me other business I have never advertised in my life, it can be done. And so what I'm saying is when you tie in to tech technology and people and old mindsets and new mindsets together, what you're seeing is, there's a remarkably great opportunity to take just a little bit, a little slice of what LinkedIn can offer and turn that into a key that opens the door for your future that you're much more in control of. And I think that's a very satisfying place to be. So that's one example. I'll pause for a second, but I have a second one coming up too. Well,


Ari Gronich 10:41  

I appreciate that. That's, it's good advice for people to remember that these platforms are really about relationship building versus, you know, cold selling.


Steve Prentice 10:54  

Absolutely. cold call selling was was a thing. Of course, we know that and some people still do it. I used to teach courses in sales to a big bank. And I was shocked. This is only about 20 years ago. And I was shocked that they were still using 1950s concepts called smile and dial you know you're performing, you just have a list of numbers you call them. And you expect a 98% rejection rate You're doing well, if you get two calls out of 100 that don't hang up on you. Now, is that really a way to do business? Wouldn't you rather have someone who says, Hey, I'm looking for a good accountant? Can you recommend one? And when a trusted friend of mine says yes, I know this person. Now I've got the word of mouth and the trust factor at a much higher level. And there are technologies that allow retailers to do that, for example, if you are a small business owner, a store owner, or if you own a larger store with lots of sales associates, what can you do to pull in the data that your customers may have entered into their profile on your website, talking about the things that they like what they love, so that when you do speak to them, you're speaking to them on a much higher level saying, Oh, yes, last time you were in the shop, you bought this, you know, these are examples. There's there's so many examples we could use that show this kind of connection between people. And it's been a difficult year for people who are now learning to work from home. And that's that's a big challenge not only for adults, but for school aged children as well. And one of the biggest problems that we see from a technological standpoint with people is security in terms of we hear all the stories all the time about companies getting breached, and data being leaked, and malware and ransomware. And hospitals being held hostage by this is terrible stuff. And so much of this comes from us humble humans, you know that most of the the bad stuff it gets into an organization isn't done through a sophisticated drilling technique. It's done by fooling us humans to let them in at the vampires in. So this means that we have to learn how to use passwords and passwords have been for the last 20 years. For a lot of people, it's going to be the names of their kids, the dogs their first school, the most common password to this day is something like password 123 or 123456. And even administrators who look after the computers for us, will so often use admin or admin 123 is their password to save time. It's a hassle trying to think about passwords. So my point is, well, why should it be? You know, first of all, it shouldn't really be up to us to have to do this. But unfortunately we do because we are the weak link in the chain, whether we're working from home or getting that email in the you know, in your inbox at work that says hey, click on this, it's a job application or it's a it's a COVID hygiene update, something like that, then we get fooled into clicking on the bad stuff. Now when it comes to managing passwords, we should never have to write another password. Again, there are password management software programs out there, which will generate passwords for you that are amazingly complicated. They're strings of letters and numbers and punctuation that you could never possibly memorize. Now, reason I'm saying this is because they do work, of course. But for the end user, there's a trust factor that says How can I let go of this thing. I'm comfortable maintaining passwords that I can remember, now you're asking me to give this over to a piece of software to use. And I'm letting go of the control of using these passwords. So this is the Rubicon, if you'd like the river that I have to get people over to say, to understand how password management software works, that you don't have to memorize them any longer. It will take care of this for you. Every time you log on to your favorite web page, it will log you in but nobody else can get in because these are too difficult to figure out. And they say oh, I couldn't possibly let go of this. I need to I need to have control over my passwords. So I say okay, quick little test here. Think about the third person on your contact list in your phone and tell me what their phone number is. And they'll say, I don't know. I just pull it up and it dials for me. And it's an aha so you're not worried about forgetting there. numbers because your phone will take care of it. And it's like, it's a bit like a gotcha moment to show that we have emerged into some areas where we have let go of the control and given it over to our machines, not in any way to lose control, but to share the control. And those are the kinds of fear concepts that I work with. So I'm not plugging in the individual password management brand, other than saying, everybody should use one, you know, choose the one that your trusted colleagues recommends. But you should not be using passwords. And you certainly should not be using, for example, honest answers to challenge questions like What was the name of your first high school, or what was the name of your first pet, because anybody who's a good troller, and cybercriminal, can find those things out from your Facebook profile or any other social thing. So we got to move away from an old school mindset that was good 2030 years ago. But now it's a matter of sharing the technology, sharing the intelligence and letting go a bit of the grunt work if you'd like, but feeling trust that you're still in control. So that's what I try to help people do is to recognize that these technologies do indeed work extremely well for us, they can make your career, your life, your finances are so much more satisfying and successful. But it does require a little bit of, you know, putting a toe in the water and trying these things out and seeing just what they can do for you.


Ari Gronich 16:23  

Got it. So that's cool. And we've got this situation going on right now in the world where the technology that we've been trusting to use and connect and network is beginning a systematic process of censorship and echo chamber algorithmic, you know, delivery systems that basically keep us inside of a bubble that is based on our preconceived notions. And, you know, we've we're basically in this very odd, strange place where most people don't even know where they've been taken to in the last 510 years. And on the level of both technology and organizational psychology, that psychology part of how does one, you know, kind of step out of the matrix, so to speak, and yet still utilize the matrix for the benefit that it's that is there without falling into the traps of it?


Steve Prentice 17:36  

A two word answer critical thinking, people need to regain their capacity to think critically and think for themselves. What has happened over the last couple of decades is we have moved from a thinking society to exactly as you said, which is an echo chamber in which people seek out the news and the truth that matches their current biases. That could be a freedom of expression type concept, really, I want to seek out the news source that matches my political ideology. Okay, that's fair enough. But as a sort of a side story to illustrate this point. I come from England originally, and a lot of people who visit England are surprised, or at least they were in again in previous years, how well educated the taxi drivers seem to be, you know, you can have a conversation with a cab driver in London, and that person will tell you anything and everything about whatever you want to know. In fact, comedian George Burns once said, you know, it's amazing that taxi drivers and barbers aren't running the world because they seem to know so much about everything. But what it came down to was an education system not just only in the UK, but just just in the times where it was okay to learn stuff more than just simply what was there for your job. You know, you might say, Why does a taxi driver need to know about the the civil war you know, the US revolution, anything like that Revolutionary War, knowledge is a powerful thing, the enjoyment of knowledge, the learning, the capacity to think and see both sides is the kind of stuff that has been lost as we have channeled our way into exactly that individual channels of enjoyment. You know, every member of your family may be watching different TV shows on different TVs are on their devices, so there's no opportunity for collective discussion, it's a matter of just simply slurping in the stuff that you want to see. So honestly, if you want to break free of the echo chamber without endangering, but instead of actually perhaps strengthening your political beliefs or ideologies, whatever they happen to be, we have to have a critical thinking the capacity to think and question things, see both sides and then come to a conclusion. This by the way, our is something that the future of work specialists are speaking about all the time, you know, no matter what line of business you want to be in, whether it's in mechanical trade or in in high tech or in US professional service of some sort. The future of work is going to be based around a human skills such as critical thinking, and empathy and it can capacity to listen actively to others, because certain of our skills will be swallowed up by AI technologies. And they're getting better at certain jobs like travel agents, and so forth. Now, you can do it all online, as you know. But what's going to make us as individuals still valuable, is as we surf the career waves looking for what we want to do, the ability to do those very human and subtle concepts, such as once again, thinking critically. This means going back to our previous concept that when you get an email coming into your inbox that might be from me from Steve says, Hey, you know, click on this thing, it's a really great piece of instruction on how to do better COVID hygiene in your office, you pause and say, wait a second, is that really from Steve, should I really click on this? It's stopping and thinking rather than just rushing headlong into everything on a reactionary level. And I want to add one more thing to that, if I may. We are working with technologies that are primary light source based technologies, you know, we're looking at screens and the computers in our phones. And this is not tinfoil hat thinking here, it's quite straightforward is that your optical system, your brain and your eyes are designed to process information that is pretty analog and are based on reflected light, you know, pen and paper, just stuff that you can see. So when you start getting into stuff that it's coming at you from a light source, it is actually routed through the brain differently. And that's one of the reasons why it's so hard to resist wanting to respond to an email message or a text message. It's not the nature of the message, it is actually how it impacts your nervous system to say this is urgent, you must deal with it right now. And so we combine therefore, again, a micro channeling of information, you know, by choosing the the channels that match your current mindset, with the fact that we are still slaves to biological reflexes that haven't caught up with the technologies that we have at our disposal. And so we respond to them in disproportionately urgent ways. And together, these things have created a kind of a perfect storm, stopping people from really being able to think clearly as individuals. And so that would be my long winded answer. For us. That's the approach we need to take, once again, the solution is within us. It's easy, and it's free. But it does require that we focus back again on the capacity to think critically, from one or two or 10 sides of an argument and pull in as much information as possible before moving forwards. And those who seek to do this, again, it becomes one of those intangible but highly valuable skills that can be applied to all kinds of businesses and jobs moving forward.


Ari Gronich 22:37  

Yeah, so in my book, a new tomorrow, I talk a lot about critical thinking common sense and recognizing the butterfly effector cause and effect in general, and how the consequences to our actions don't just stop with the direct consequences, but there's a consequence to the consequences to the consequence to the consequences and etc. And in some ways, we need to get back to a place where common sense critical thinking is common again, because right now, it's it's not common. But at the same time, I also talk about the things like the poisons that are in our air and our water, and the neurotoxic abilities of those that chemistry to affect whether we can cognitively thinking critically think as well as we used to be or if that's being suppressed via some of those chemicals. And like one of those chemicals is fluoride in our water does absolutely zero good. But it was originally used by the war machine in in Germany, to control the minds of the soldiers so that they were easily programmable. And all of a sudden, like mid 1940s, all of a sudden, we're putting it now in our water here in the United States and claiming that it's going to help with our teeth when we know that scientifically speaking, you have to have a different form of fluoride, and it has to be a direct application of this different form in order for to do any benefit for our teeth. But that's not the only thing that's a neurotoxin, that's kind of causing this situation of lack of critical thinking, lack of common sense. What have you found as a psychologist, you know, basically, difference between 20 years ago and today in the ability to have common sense and critical thinking in the population. Have you have you found that it's had a significant drop or a minor drop Are you know, What have you found,


Steve Prentice 25:01  

I don't see that it's had a drop or an increase, I think we have just simply expanded logarithmically the volume of everything. If you go back 20 3040 100 years, you're still gonna have organizations that have a vested interest in suppressing the truth. You know, they're Photoshop, you know, is a new technology, but faking photographs has been around since photographs existed, the concepts like fluoride, or sodium in the water, suppressing the information for situations like Love Canal, and other places where, you know, lots of industrial dumping went on. Organizations have always continued to suppress the capacity to find the truth and not saying suppress the truth, but suppress people's capacity to find the truth. You know, in the era where we had three or four major television channels, and we had trusted news readers like Walter Cronkite, it was, that was the target was was how to manage that particular narrow flow of information. But now, in this age, of course, you know, as we've seen, with the rise of some large social media platforms, anybody can post anything and and basically generate a circle of followers very, very easily. So the the problem has magnified exponentially, as you know, and in league with the opportunities for us to use the technologies for our own devices. So yeah, it really hasn't changed, you know, in terms of additional subtraction, just simply expansion. But I always say that the everybody's got the the the knowledge of the world at their fingertips, literally, I mean, your phone can find you anything you want to find. just choosing one source of knowledge is going to, once again, keyhole you into one particular line of thinking. So we have that opportunity to think critically using our devices to say, Okay, if someone tells me about a particular city or town or situation going on how many areas how many different directions Can I actually find that information from and you know, come to my own educated conclusion. So no, I haven't seen it change, I just seen it, expand in scope, if you learn to me and same level, just louder, and but we now have much more opportunity to fix that problem as individuals. And it's quite a pleasurable experience just going online and seeing what I can learn from different sources before coming to a conclusion.


Ari Gronich 27:17  

Yeah, I just want to add that those different sources probably should be different than, you know, starting differently than just the search engine of Google or just Yahoo, or just being or just any specific search engine, because I know, my my stepdaughter is, is in college. And she does a lot of research and show look something up on Google and get completely different responses than if she looks it up on DuckDuckGo. Or being or one of the other search engines. And so, you know, let's talk a little bit about why it might be, you know, people have prescribed an agenda to Google, and an agenda to certain search engines and certain algorithms that they think is a cute, you know, conspiracy from some, you know, outside source that controlling the inside, right. But can it is it? Is it just that or is it what what makes that algorithm for Google completely different than the search results that you might get on a being or Yahoo or DuckDuckGo? And why is it important to to look on all of those versus just one?


Steve Prentice 28:45  

Well, the the algorithm of Google when it first when Larry Page and Sergey Brin were at the at the helm of it completely was remarkably different from those that hadn't before, which were largely keyword based. Their algorithm was based on all kinds of the number of connections and and sort of back back connections between, you know, links between websites, it was incredibly brilliant at the time. And I can't confess to knowing what they're doing with it right now. I mean, things like Google and Amazon have grown into enormous, enormous world changing beasts and the number of things they have going. It just boggles the mind literally. But But again, I always want to stop and say, Well, you know, who's a who's on the board of directors of any of these organizations. And I'm not pointing to anyone in particular, but who is now guiding the overall philosophy of this group. Because that's obviously with any organization or company how you're going to sway the the slant is is, who your directors are and who the shareholders are responding to. So something like Google Of course, it has become the industry leader of searching something it has the honor of becoming a verb, which is the the big definition here is go and Google something now, however, are there other resources and I tell people once again, I mean, when you look at these sort of the big, big top five social things, I always talk about Twitter. And I get some eye rolling because people think all they've ever seen about Twitter is certain, you know, high profile individuals abusing it for their own purposes. And yes, there's a lot of junk and a lot of offensive material on Twitter. But there's also a lot of really good people that I thought leaders intelligent people in your industry you know, even if you are working in something that you don't think is high tech, let's say you're a carpenter, you build you do floors, hardwood flooring, okay? What can I possibly learn from Twitter about hardwood flooring? Well, there are people out there who are talking about trends and design new techniques and procedures for treating woods and so forth. These are thought leaders, and they're not necessarily going to be putting up a big website, or even their own podcast, they're going to be just simply posting a thought here or there. So one of the best ways of micro learning because lifelong learning is one of these key future steps to think about as well. Lifelong Learning doesn't mean taking courses all the time, it's also about taking five minutes to read the tweets of these thought leaders who have chosen to follow. So ignore the 10 billion other people who are saying stupid stuff and just focus on 10 or 20. People who are thought leaders, researchers, people, you'd want to meet at a at a conference, let's say, and just see what they're saying about your industry or about something peripheral to that industry. That is where knowledge can come from as an ultimate source to running through the Google matrix or any other search engine metrics, find those leaders who don't have a vested interest in being found on Google, they just simply exploring the world their own way. One of my favorites is the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute. I mean, I'm not a marine biologist, I just happen to love nature in the water, I just love oceans and ocean life as as just from a lay person's perspective. So I love reading some of the scientists who go down in the diving submarines and just look around and so forth. It's very, very enlightening, but also enjoyable, even though I have no desire to become a marine biologist. So those are people on my special list, and I enjoy learning, just learning peripherally peripherally, from what they have to share. So micro learning opportunities in places that aren't, let's say structured and guided, the way that perhaps the major search engines might be is one opportunity. Once again, just looking for a doing searching by keywords across not only the standard search engines, but there are sort of micro search engines within universities or looking deeper, it'd be on page one, into what else is out there. It's obvious that the internet is the easiest way to do this. It's at your table, it's right there physically at your fingertips, rather than going to a library or taking the course somewhere. But once again, just a matter of spreading out the searching not only a sort of outbound searching by typing in keywords, but more importantly, inbound searching by reading articles.


I like for example, Google news alerts. And even though that's going back to Google, I can set up some news alerts with keywords. And it will bring in stories from the the news wires that are of importance to me, but there because I've that I've set up those search terms rather than going through their actual algorithms. So I guess bottom line is to cast your net wide, but don't simply rely on search engines and their collected wisdom that way, but search out those people, if I read an essay that has been posted by somebody who I'm following on Twitter, now I'm reading their white paper, their documents, and that's moving me into another world of knowledge that Google may not have caught up with yet. So that's what I would say is just just diversify your intellectual portfolio by just looking for people thought leaders, once again, it's the human connection that I think is going to drive people further and give you whether it's just directly applicable knowledge or peripherally peripherally applicable knowledge, or just simply connections to other people. That's that's the true dividend of being connected online, I think.


Ari Gronich 33:57  

Cool. So I'm gonna ask you to contradict yourself a little bit, but not really, which is why Does somebody want magazines and newspapers and the printed word to stay printed versus just be online or audio


Steve Prentice 34:19  

printed word has a far greater impact on your brain than does do the same words on screen much further. The reason I said before, the pace by which your eyes and brain process information is far more in line with analog than with digital. So you can read the same essay or the same article on screen as you could with a paper version as well and you will retain more from that paper version. This is just a nature of how your our brains are constructed. So I would very much be in favor of of sitting down and reading something on paper. As much as I am a technical enthusiast. I just think that's a great way of really pulling information in at the pace that you want. Obviously, there's a sidebar to that. In fact, the most things that are published are published by once again, multinational media companies who have a vested interest in you buying stuff, I mean, when only had to look has to look at all the magazines you could possibly buy in a, you know, brick and mortar bookstore, there's just so many special interest magazines. But there is an actual haptic tangible pleasure for many people in thumbing through a magazine is a different interaction completely from being on screen. And even younger people who have grown up completely surrounded by the information online, can recognize that there's a tangible difference when actually sitting down and reading a magazine or a book. So it's always going to be people's personal choice. It's obviously much more expensive to create and manufacture, hardcopy, and it's also less ecologically sound to do so. But from an information processing perspective, it is it is a few marks above, in terms of its efficacy as a deliverer of information.


Ari Gronich 36:04  

Yeah, so you know, I look at things like what you're saying, economical, you know, benefits to not printing, because of that extra resource. But then I saw a statistic about how much electricity it takes for you to do one single Google search. And the amount of energy it takes for a single Google search was exponential, comparatively to the call of nature of paper, especially if you went back to some of the sustainable sources of paper, like hemp paper, and things like that. So it's an interesting conundrum, I believe that we are trying to do things that are good for nature, we're trying to create more sustainability and sustainable practices. But we end up creating situations where we literally are doing the exact opposite of the intention. And this is a place for critical thinking and common sense to start playing in. And I'll give a really quick example of that, and that is the original Prius, and I'm not sure if they changed this or not, but they were, you know, digging the nickel mines in Canada. And then they would ship those raw nickel, you know, material to China, on oil driven, you know, ship barges, and then they would have to go and do all of the taking of that material and turning it into and processing it into the battery, and then it would ship somewhere else for them to actually start to assemble. And that was another layer of waste and lack of sustainability. And so, by the time a Prius got back to the States, it had gone back and forth, I think a few times or parts of it had and you had already consumed. I think it was four or five times more. And I don't remember the numbers Exactly. But the the amount of lifetime value of the savings of the electric benefit, right. And it's also given rise to this massive industry of electric vehicles, which could one day be more sustainable than they are expendable or more than were expending. So is the benefit and does they outweigh the benefit outweigh the loss is the the consequence to the action? Right? And the consequences to those actions? Are they relative and sustainable? And when it comes to profit, does the profit really matter? If we're talking about human lives and the ability to live on a planet that we've been kind of raping?


Steve Prentice 39:35  

Well, there's there's two big questions there, he said is that one is actually sustainable. And the other one is, does the profit concept really matter? With regards to sustainability, it's a horse race, obviously, I mean, ultimately, if you could sort of say that the all those electric cars will eventually get manufactured more locally, or if they do need to be shipped across the world. They'll be shipped on on boats that are maybe wind powered. There are New, you know, sales like sale based freighters out already. You could you could see that the leveling of that particular curve over time as all the technologies that support the manufacturer, that electric car, and all of the the grid supports the electrical charging, including your own capacity to recharge from your home using the solar powers and solar panels rather.


If we can win that horrible horse race, then yes, I think you can move ahead and generations to come would look back on the 19th and 20th centuries as a dark ages unto itself. But when you look back on the Dark Ages prior to this, or even in the 17 1800s, during the Industrial Revolution, where there were smokestacks belching out coal and wood effluent everywhere, we've come a long way from burning anything in sight to make heat and make power and horses dropping their stuff all over the all over the place. And the diseases that came from that sewage systems, you know, just the infrastructure that we have, has brought us a long way from the dirt. We were scrabbling around with just a mere 300 years ago. So can we do it? Can we get to that utopia where these things are actually making a net gain in terms of ecological sustainability? Yes, but are we going to do it in time? Or? That's the big question because people may scoff at the concept of when when the scientists once again say the average temperature is going up by two degrees Celsius. And everyone says, what, two degrees Celsius big deal, that means nothing. And the scientists themselves have admitted perhaps they were wrong in the way they marketed that because when they say two degrees, they're talking about an average global average. So countries like Australia or, or places like California may be burning themselves to the ground. And that's raising temperatures on one extreme there. And there are extremes of cold happening elsewhere. And so they average it out. That's again, the problem with scientists and technologists as they are way too literal, and they expect the rest of the world to follow that. So that's an average guys, which means that there's a lot of up and down happening. So is it sustainable, maybe if we can beat the the kind of landslide we have created in in in warming the earth jus to not only carbon effluence of our own, but you know, as the as the ice is retreating, of course it's releasing methane in the ground. It is cutting back on the Earth's capacity to reflect light so there's all these ancillary ways in which we're heating the earth is not all industry. But to your second point, you know, is this profitable to do this? I'm always kind of amazed when I watch the the it's not only in the states of course but around the world the the the big oil and the big industry bigwigs who fight tooth and nail against progress because they have too much money to be made still in oil and coal. And I wonder if they were to turn their their manufacturing processes into creating solar and tidal power, they could still make money there there's a profit margin there too, if that was it, and that is the thing that motivates most people, sadly, is that we are a we are a predatory species we are there to to beat our way to the top of the human pile as well as you know, just just to survive that there's no question that we are a predatory species so the profit motive will never die away. I'm not saying I agree with it, but I'm saying that will never die away because it is just fundamental to human instinct to survive and thrive and if I have a billion dollars and you have zero Well too bad for you, I've got my world community and I'm safe and that is again I'm not in not condoning that or agreeing with it. But it is a fundamental principle of survival. So the profit margin will not go away but it's very easy to turn around and say well you can make as much money building wind farms as you can drilling into the ground and fracking all the all the limestone you there's ways you can generate renewable energies, why not simply transfer that and that's that's what I have a hard time grasping. I mean, I know when I'm on level why they do it, but it's it's not like everyone says, Okay, let's stop drilling oil. And you guys just just twiddle your thumbs for 100 years? No, there's there's a lot of things they could do to replace that. And these technologies are emerging. Wind turbines Do not kill bald eagles by the millions. But even with new technologies and turbines do not have to spin around like big blades that are wavy ones that look like the ripple fins of a jellyfish or a cuttlefish that wiggle around the oscillates rather than rotate. So can we do this? Boy, that's not what I want to put any money on because we are in a horse race against the the ecology and the the the climate change that is inevitably happening here is undoubtedly happening. But if we can turn it around to speak the language of profits, because hand in hand with profit motive, of course, his political motive people want their voters to continue to vote for them. This is again, every country in the world that has vote Democrat democracy or a parent democracy, so they're not going to want to lay off 100,000 oil wells. occurs, because that gets remembered during an election. So the politicians themselves must also come on board with this, I'm seeing a slow shift towards this. But the matter is, is that shift that is slow, sufficiently fast to get us out of this this pincer movement that's happening between us and the ecology. So it's, it's a big long way of saying, I'm not quite sure.


Ari Gronich 45:24  

I appreciate that. And, and I'm going to ask you another one you might not be so sure about, but is there something other than money, that, psychologically would be more important for a profit because you can profit with money, or you can profit with, you know, a purpose? Meaning that you have a purpose and the purpose reaches its its goal? And so where is the money on the scale of motivation? You know, if you're looking at motivating factors, profit might be here, is there something above financial profit or not, because we already know that people are below financial profit in most people's value books, so or at least in in the way that we've arranged our society.


Steve Prentice 46:26  

To my understanding, the only thing higher than profit as a goal is power. And when you look at people who have more money than they could possibly spend, you know, their grandchildren or possibly spend, the next thing they seek is power, political power. And that is inevitable. I mean, I like reading books on history from the last few centuries, because none of what's happening right now is new. It's happened over and over again. You know, we had a pandemic in 1918, almost 100 years ago. Some of the extreme right wing movements that are happening, happened 100 years ago, they happen 300 years ago, the madness of crowds, which is an actual title of a book, popular delusions and the madness of crowds, is all about how crowds do sort of come together around a concept. And then they whip that up into a frenzy that becomes a movement. And this again, has happened over the centuries over tulip bulbs and over all kinds of either profit making ventures in the New World, or the fear of witchcraft, or the fear of communism, or now the fear of cryptocurrency and blockchain, it's, it's all the same, the same kind of thing, that there's a collective fear that comes from the contagion of emotion that people share. So I don't think the profit is ever going to go away as the as the primary motivator for all of human undertakings. Many who disagree with that point, there's a lot of selfless people out there, there's a lot of those who are working, almost, you know, working themselves to death to save lives right now. Yes, on an individual level, but when you look collectively at any country that has millions of people, and it has a leader, the leaders tend to evolve, or ones that are focused primarily on profits, and on the power that comes from that. And when you look at countries that had had a strong socialist base, some of the Scandinavian countries, for example, and Canada, there's, there's a social safety net, and so on. It's a wonderful thing to have. But it's still not looked upon with great trust by the majority of the world, it just seems to wrong. So I would love to be wrong. On this point, I would love for humanity as a whole to come back to I think what a lot more of our ancestors are First Nations people in all countries that had that symbiosis with nature, and recognized how we all can exist together, I'd love for us to go back to some sort of mindset from that. But this particular Millennium has been focused right from, you know, at 1000, right through to now has been focused just on pure, just just getting as fast and as far as you can, and reaping the profits along the way. So I don't see that ending anytime soon. So any solutions have to be built into that language? And there's little bits of cracks of light here and there that we're seeing, but it is quite the struggle.


Ari Gronich 49:19  

Yeah, you know, it's interesting to me, because I look at I look at the world and and I'm kind of disappointed that people haven't quite figured out that we made this stuff up that this is all a figment of our collective imagination. And they can choose to have the outcomes that we currently have, or we can choose to create different outcomes if we get brave enough to change the constructs of how we've constructed the society. And so just on that psychological level, I you know, I'm I'm curious about that power versus profit or profit, leading to power being the ultimate motivation, because I'm not sure that I've met too many people that truly want power over another person. And so I feel like like there might be a conversation about how somebody can get power over themselves, without having to have power over somebody else. So that they can become that fulfill, you know, have that fulfillment of having that power. And I think that most attempts at power over other people are because they feel like they have no power over themselves.


Steve Prentice 50:55  

It's very possible. Indeed, I think when you look at any cross section of political leaders in any country, you're seeing exactly that people who perhaps weren't able to have power over themselves. And so they do pursue that that other path to have power over others. There's there's a, it's a mindset, they're about justifying your existence by having power over others. And you don't need to have a country of 300 million people, we're all 300,000,001 of the presidents and they want to have that power, you only need a few to climb that particular ladder. But I think going back to one of our earlier points, if you want to have power over yourself, you want to have a sense of self fulfillment and destiny, and just being able to drive your life the way you'd like it. Yes, I think that is eminently in anybody's hands. And once again, the the capacity we have for career management's and for just being aware of what's available out there in the world, that allows you to step out from under a shadow of fear that you may have whoever's holding power over you. Now the question becomes, why are they holding power over you now? And what can you do about it? So what number one is going to be your employer because you fear losing your job? Okay, well, remember that fear, there are two sides to the human existence, which is central to this, this statement here, we have an emotional side and a rational side. And the emotion side always wins. And the most powerful emotion of all, is fear. So fear is going to guide people and drive people to do things. When you look at the the masking controversy, you know, people who want to wear masks or don't want to wear masks in this particular situation. Those who do wear masks have recognized the logic of the the the transmission barrier that a mask provides. Those who do not largely are either fearing an invasion of their privacy or doubting it's the masks capacity, or fearing the reality that the mask symbolizes of the current pandemic that we're in is a big, big thing. We go down in that particular rabbit hole, but it's all about fear. So we have the fear of all kinds of things in the world. And so my question becomes, how can we now step out from under our own shadow of fear? And use logic to say, what can I fix about this? If I'm afraid of my boss, and I'm afraid of getting fired. So I work 18 hours a day, I do everything that is asked of me, because I fear getting fired. I'm going to say, Okay, let's change that fear. I wrote a I'm not plugging my book. But I just wanted to share the title that I wrote a book called work like a wolf. And the reason I wrote the book called work like a wolf is because when you compare wolves to dogs, wolves know how to find the next meal, they know how to go out there and hunt down their next meal. Dogs, my love, I have to have my own. But dogs have been domesticated, they traded their, their freedom for a regular meal and a warm place to sleep. So they wait to get fed. But a wolf has always got to keep his or her hunting instincts sharp to find out where their next opportunity is going to come from. When people can turn that on with themselves. So rather than being afraid of being fired, I want to say, I'm not afraid of being fired. I want to I want to build in myself my capacity of knowing what my skills are, where I can sell them and what I can do to always feel that I am in control, I have the power of myself career wise, by not being afraid of being fired. So that would be one of my answers to you there is power of oneself comes from learning what is causing you fear, and learning, recognizing how that fear dominates us purely physiologically and psychologically. And then saying, Okay, how can I eliminate that fear through facts? How can I find the facts to neutralize the fear? If I fear getting fired? Okay, what can I do to avoid getting fired? Well, I can learn more skills, I can learn more relationship management with the people around me, but I can also ensure my future by knowing what else is out there and how I can find it. And I really strongly believe everyone deserves to do that even if you're in a highly specific line of work that requires a factory if it let's say you're an aircraft engine mechanic. Great, you know, you can't open up your own competitor to Boeing. But you can find out what else is out there for aircraft manufacturers to, to, to sell their skills on. And similar to that, look at personal financial management, how to eliminate debt, how to pay down or eliminate credit card debts and all the things that at least in my generation, we were never taught in school never taught financial literacy. So learn how to take control of your own money. So you're no longer afraid of debt collectors, or banks and credit ratings and stuff like that. There's a lot of stuff much like the whole fluoride thing you were saying before that has been kind of implanted in US culturally, I was never taught about mortgages or credit cards, and I went to school.


In fact, I remember that you had to be 21. And you had to qualify to get your first credit card. This is not so long ago, it was maybe 25 years ago. But now of course, you can get them they sent to you all the time. So the point is, learn about career management, learn about financial management, by taking control of those two things alone, you now step out from under the shadow of fear, and you start that particular an individual path of self power, power over self power over your own life. Nobody can fire you if you are able to sell your job or sell your skills somewhere else. And I'm saying that somewhere else exists, it exists. And then once again, it's at your fingertips to find it. Cool. So


Ari Gronich 56:27  

on that psychological level of fear, versus the psychological level of hope. I find that in my experience with people fear typically beats out hope. So what are some techniques that somebody can who's listening, can actualize can do when the fear of something has outweighed the hope. And they see and it stops them in their tracks.


Steve Prentice 57:13  

Once again, a short answer, write it down. I know that sounds weird to say it. But when you get the things that are circling in your head that are causing you fear, so long as they stay in your head, you will not be able to to slay those dragons, you have to get them physically out so you can see them. And here's what we have different kinds of memory in the body and the mind, we have short term memory long term memory and physical muscle memory, the thing that reminds you, you know, which which drawer which which which cupboard your coffee cup is, and you just simply open it by by default, you drive by physical by muscle memory, largely long term memory is where most of our memories are stored for most of our lives. The short term memory, however, is very limited. The two most people will say about eight items at one time. So if I was to dictate a 10 item list for you to go out and buy some stuff for me, without writing it down somewhere, you'd be lucky. If you remember eight, then if you get a phone call along on the way you'll be lucky if you remember to or even which store you're going to because your short term memory has been used up, it's been flushed, it's like the ram of a computer. So when you're wrestling with fear with problems with worry, the the more they circle around in that short term memory, there is no space for anything else to come in. So I always tell people, this is therapy, right? Whether it's self therapy, where you use a surface like paper, or a dry erase board or a smartboard on a conference call video conference. Or you use the vessel that is a counselor or a psychologist or therapist, someone who takes those thoughts and holds them for you. No matter what vessel or surface you use, you get these things out. Because when you get them out, number one, you can see them, you can see them again, you vet them from the outside and you reprocess them, which allows you to think them through even further. But secondly, you give your short term memory permission to let go of them. It actually won't forget them The moment you stop trying to remember them. That's ironically weird. But that's the one forget it as soon as you stop trying to remember. But it allows you now to work on the next level of solving your own problems. So when you go to a counselor or a psychologist, that person should not tell you what to do. I mean a physician, a doctor might prescribe something for you, a psychiatrist might prescribe a medicine or a technique for you. But psychologists and therapists are supposed to ask you how did this make you feel? You know, what do you think about this and pull out the the answers from you so you can solve your own problems with their guiding hands to help you along the way. So my answer once again is for people who are stuck in this this storm of worry and fear. The best way to get out of that is to write these things physically down somewhere. The act of writing especially handwriting as opposed to typing will give your brain the chance, as I said to look at it vetted, question it again. And create the space for the next thoughts and ideas to come in. And on a larger scale, if you're dealing with a problem that you wish to share with others, or if it's a work related problem, a crisis or an opportunity to innovate on a new product, same thing, get it out on a surface where everyone can see it, because then you're also going to benefit from the collective wisdom and experience of others in the room, the sum becomes greater than the parts when they can all see things. But the longer you keep things bottled up inside your head, the longer the problem will live with you. So that's my short answer is just write it down.


Ari Gronich 1:00:33  

Awesome, thank you. So what other kinds of things do you like to chat about when it comes to the collision of technology and people? What you know, what do you think of the idea that we soon are going to be part human part technology?


Steve Prentice 1:00:56  

Oh, we already are, I think I mean, we are. So imagine leaving your house and forgetting your phone. Oh, my goodness, I gotta go back. Gotta go get it. So we are part human part technology, you can't live without your phone. I remember one, sort of public speaker, psychologist type person doing this, it's something I would never do for a live audience. But he actually went and collected people's phones from the audience and watching the fear in their eyes when they lost this cherished device. So I think that ship has already sailed, we have, we have the greatest advice ever known to humankind. Isaac Asimov once said, The perfect machine is something with no moving parts. And that's what we have here is that a phone, you know, which is only one small part of your smartphone has no moving parts, per se, it could be anything you want it to be in terms of the apps that are available. So we have learned to create great tools, you know, hugely powerful thing much on on line with invention of steam power, and or even just meat, being able to make fire, you know, this, these are really great advances. So I want to see how we can make those, again, serve humanity in better ways. And one of the best ways I have found is in education. There's a concept that I love following called flipped schooling. And looking at all the young people out there, and especially when you keep track of the innovations that are happening with people who are 13 years old, or 19 years old, just just young people who've just come up with these amazing ideas, because they're there, they're not yet under the yoke of their employer and other particular restraints. They have brilliance that the traditional schooling system in most countries has, has always credit keep channeled into like a sausage factory, just move people through and push them out the other end, the flipped schooling, if you haven't heard of that before, have you heard of that before? You know, No, I haven't. Okay, so So what it is essentially is, you know, you and I went to school, you're the teacher would tell you a bunch of stuff boring in the way that the teachers taught back then, and send you home with a big bunch of homework, and you got to work this stuff through by yourself on the kitchen table, trying to figure out what the heck you just learned, flipped schooling, says, Okay, let's take those two things and turn them around. So we send students home with, let's say, videos, videos that are not not just your average YouTube video, but carefully created videos on a topic, let's say maybe it is a math topic that's visual and a bit more better explaining how a math topic works. So you learn that stuff on your own time at home, then you go back to class. And that's when you can capitalize on the teacher's knowledge to work through what you're trying to understand. Because learning is not about just hearing words, it's about massaging them into your brain and your soul in a way that will will stay and become something useful. So if I learn about, let's say, a component of algebra, or trigonometry, or geometry, or whatever, then I can go back to class during the day and ask the teacher What do you mean by this? Or how would it apply to that, I can now leverage the teacher's knowledge and skills to add to this sort of static knowledge I learned in the evening. So flipped schooling, paired with the fact that we are living in the era of the audience of one now that your educational requirements, your attention span, your personality type are going to be different from mine. If you're a Type A and I'm a Type B, we're going to learn differently. If you're a morning person, and I'm a night owl, we're going to learn differently. If I've got to look after three kids in a single parent household, and someone else gets to drive home to, you know, a much more luxurious thing, we're going to learn differently. So schooling should be that schooling should be as tailored and as individualized as your personal account is at your bank when you go online to be served as you as already not as one of a customer base. So I love the idea of flipping around the education prospect not only for school aged kids, but for adults, adult learners too, in a way that fits their individual learning style, their schedule, but more importantly, that you leverage the wisdom of the teacher by using what they can share with you to apply to those facts you have now heard rather than the teacher being a simple messenger of basic facts. So that exists To me enormously, I think that the opportunity for people to learn not only in the wealthy countries of the world, but as Internet access is being delivered to the much poor areas of the world, such as Africa and India and places like that, you're going to see a lot more people suddenly be able to grasp and use the intelligence they were born with, or that they can generate through these technologies. It's a great equalizer. But I think for humanity, it's going to be a lot more interesting and beneficial as these gates open up, because technology makes it possible. But I think it starts once again by retooling the approach to learning to become more human, and just using the technological and human resources of the learning process in the appropriate proportions.


Ari Gronich 1:05:47  

Okay, so I'm going to go back to my previous question. And that's about humans becoming more robotic, and having technology more embedded in their systems like say, you know, things that trigger your brain to perform better things that nanotechnology, I'm talking about the things that will live inside of us, not the things that we can bring along or leave, you know, like a phone. Because, you know, there are some of us who like to divorce our phones every now and then, and we'll, you know, take time off from them, and so on. And we have that ability, but we may not for very long have the ability to shut off the things that are, you know, possibly going to be implanted into us, I know, there's a lot of fear going on out there that we're going to be implanted with devices that will tell people whether we've had vaccines or not, whether we you know, we've been in contact with somebody or not where you know, that GPS, and contact traces at all times, things like that. So that's more of the issues that I'm looking at, as far as that question goes, is, are we going to recognize what we choose to do to ourselves, so to speak? Or, and, and are we going to be able to put in any safeguards that stop, you know, bad actors from becoming bad actors with that kind of technology?


Steve Prentice 1:07:25  

I think it would be possible to divorce yourself from technology, it would be a lot of work. I know, I know, people personally who have paid to have every mention of them on the internet removed. I'm not sure if that's something we have to do every year because things will grow. Is it possible? I don't think it's possible. I think it's also again, a ship that has sailed. I mean, you could say I do not carry a phone, I will not carry a phone. Okay, fine. But just walking down your street, you'll be recorded probably by about six or seven or 10. doorbell cameras, as you go by. There's very little we can do in our world right now that isn't being recorded some house, I think it's a matter of what degree you wish to divorce yourself from the technologies themselves. When you go to make a buy your groceries. Okay, you can do it online, which more people are doing this year, of course,


Ari Gronich 1:08:15  

yeah. So I'm just going to go back to I get that we are embedded in our technology on a outside of us basis, but most people don't have electronic or AI driven hearts, they don't have eyes that are like Google eyes that or contact lenses embedded in their, you know, in their eyeballs, giving them the access to what the story is that they're walking next to because it's connected to the GPS. We don't have those things yet, but they are coming. Those are things that have been in the works and so I'm not necessarily concerned with the things that we can do currently at the moment to stop ourselves from being using the technology I'm talking about the the time period when this ramp up becomes we are part machine part human. Because if we don't do that, that you know the things to make our brains work better. We're not we're going to fall behind in school if we don't do the things that are going to make our eyesight better. We're going to fall behind in the world of human beings. I'm talking about kind of Gatica you know that movie Gatica with Ethan Hawke those kinds of times when the human being has been genetically modified, and technologically modified to become this part man part robot thing. Right? Yeah, that's where that's where the fear lies. The fear doesn't lie so much and using the phone Some people yes, but that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about go go further with me on that journey of fear and technology colliding with people. Yeah.


Steve Prentice 1:10:14  

Well, I mean, first of all, I will admit, I'm all for that. I don't have any particular worries about it. Personally, I think about pacemakers, for example, that have been around for a while. I think about for example, that diabetics no longer have to prick their fingers to to check their their blood count, they can now do it by waving their phone at their embedded device in their arm. I think yes, there's a slippery slope upwards in terms of other things in terms of memory enhancements, or movement enhancements that that are maybe even microscopic and level, or things that go down to delivering medications through your arteries and self propelled miniature submarines. This is not I'm not making this up, there are teeny tiny miniature submarines that can can deliver Kleenex or chemical medicines to your your body based on propelling themselves through your arteries. According to an internal navigation system. I think that stuff is incredible. And I think it's just part of a long line of of evolutionary techniques, we have learned from the days that we first learned to lift a bone and use it as a club. So I don't see it stopping anywhere. I think that once again, the the the wider knowledge base of golf companies and individuals who can create these for human good is something that will continue to exist. And you could say they could be used for nefarious purposes, too. But the more this has democratized, the more this is opened up to numerous sources, it's not coming from a single source, even with the whole vaccine, we're discussing at this point in history, right now, there's like four or five different companies providing vaccines for the COVID outbreak. So it's not like it's one channel that's come through the government, that's going to implant people with a vaccine that causes consternation amongst a large segment of the population. So Gosh, I think I'm in favor of it. I think it's just simply part of human evolution, technology is becoming more and more reliable. So it isn't like you've got a battery in there, that's going to stop one day, you've got components that are going to build your capacities. And I think that's a that just speaks to the fundamental urge to evolve, and using tools to evolve as part of our nature. So I hope I'm not avoiding your your answer, but I think it's great. And I look forward to seeing more of it.


Ari Gronich 1:12:29  

I saw I got your opinion, but and your opinion is awesome. And the question is more about the psychology and the fear that is associated with it, the understanding of the fear associated with it, because people listening are, you know, some are going to be really excited about the possibility of being, you know, superhuman, because they're part machine, some people are going to be really fearful of it. And so that was what I was asking you about was the psychology behind this, this kind of place that we're going. And obviously the possibility of bad actors and how that goes, you kind of addressed the possibility as far as saying that there's multiple sources, but what if all those multiple sources, like you said earlier, are all about the power and not about the people? So there you have this, this understanding of the fear that's possible?


Steve Prentice 1:13:32  

Absolutely. And I do fully understand that fear. And this is the concept of change, meaning, managing change in people's lives is an enormous thing. So there is the great potential for fear I completely recognize that but it's a matter of how it emerges upon people. If all of a sudden we said as of Monday of next week, we're going to do things this new way people are going to say no, I don't like that. Would regardless of what it is okay, self driving cars, okay, everyone's gonna have to have a self driving car as of Monday, you're going to get a lot of pushback and rebellion in the streets. But I've always loved to say that a robot is only a robot until it becomes an appliance. And what I mean by that is, when we were growing up in a robots were shiny, clunky silvery things that we're going to do everything for is like the Jetsons promised us. Now you've got a Roomba that can go around your house, not only in just a stupid grid pattern, but it can actually find its way around things intelligent because it's it's AI enhanced. That Roomba, when it first comes out is a super cool robot after you have it for about two weeks. It's an appliance like a dishwasher, just the thing that clears the house. So I find that people grow into this. I mean, Facebook didn't exist once and now it does. If someone said at one time, you know, we're going to develop this this concept that is going to list everybody you've ever known and put them in one place where you can find them. There you go, No, couldn't possibly do that. But if you recall, you will you probably won't remember any Facebook TV ads when it first came out because there weren't any everybody Just gravitated towards Facebook out of the sheer fascination of connecting with other people. When you turn to find something to do on Google streetview, if Google had gone and asked permission, offer every government, municipal, state and federal for permission to go and shoot every street in the country with cameras, we'd still be debating it today. Because asking permission is much more difficult than actually going to do it and asking forgiveness. And so Google just went out and did it and created what we now can't live without, which is the Google streetview or a street map. So just just leveraging the GPS technology that that, you know, it's circling around us in the, in the sky. So, once again, I would say, yeah, the psychology of the fear of change is enormous. And it's powerful. And we're seeing it to this day, with people resisting wearing masks as the most tangible example of exactly that. But at the same time, people wear clothes, you know, people in construction, wear boots, and hats. And that's normal. When the automobile came out, in the, you know, the early decade of the last century, one person had to walk ahead of the car with a red flag tag, showing, you know, the the car was coming, because at a breakneck speed of five miles an hour, it could kill somebody. So it was a new thing that people had to grow use to. These are these concepts, there was a big push back, I remember, when the car was, was made, possibly public, this is back in again. And that's before 1910. certain groups pushed back and said, We can't possibly allow them because they can, bank robbers will be able to drive faster than our Mounted Police can chase them, you know, and this, this is a retrograde mind of our mindset, which is typical of of change the fear of change. But the fear of change happens when things come on to us too quickly. And that's I think my key point here is that, as these technologies just move into our lives, slowly and iteratively, it's called called nudge nudge theory. And in the change management world, we don't notice it, you know, we just speak it just becomes part of our lives. So our microwave, and our dishwasher is now being joined with our robotic vacuum cleaner, and our smart doorbell. And they're only robots until they just become appliances. So honestly, I do think yes, there is a profound fear of change. And as I said, we're seeing it to this day in certain things that are changing our life too quickly. But overall, human beings also are like that horrible allegory of the boiling frog, you know, you put a frog in water and raise the temperature, it doesn't know it's being boiled. I mean, I hate that imagery. But it's what it is, is that people don't see what's happening around them. But it becomes what our life is. And my bottom line statement is that the net net of this is more benefit than harm. In the kinds of technologies we embrace.


Ari Gronich 1:17:42  

And in I'm going to agree and disagree with you. And that because I'm not really ready to become an appliance. And I get that that's what certain things have been become like robots or roombas have become an appliance. But they started off as an appliance to it just was a smarter appliance, it wasn't me becoming the robot. And, and at the same time, I'm really looking forward to the time where I could swallow a whole bunch of nano bites, and they can go in and cure all the disease that is in my system and the causes of inflammation, and then leave me but so I have the mixed feeling about it. I'm allowed to I'm a Gemini. And so we are allowed to have mixed feelings and and contradict ourselves, but you get my ideas my drift is the part where I don't like is the part where people start considering other people, a useful appliance versus a human being because we've become robotic in the way that we've evolved. Our evolution hasn't been a natural evolution, but a forced evolution of, of, of circuitry so to speak. And so you know,


Unknown Speaker 1:19:11  

that's, that's where I


Ari Gronich 1:19:13  

kind of differ in disagree, but I definitely get the excitement of the possibility. You know, it to me, it's really cool to see scientific advancement. And then I watch what they've done with the scientific advancement and I go, okay, you pretty much screwed the pooch on that one. And you turn to your scientific advancement from something that could benefit the world into something that is destroying the world. And so that's where those that dichotomy comes from. of, you know, being able to take these amazing scientific advancements, and make sure that they aren't the control, that they don't become the control versus, you know, and and maybe it's just my You know, my early childhood Terminator mind, that grew up with, with Arnold Schwarzenegger, you know, and, and that kind of influence movie, but that that's where I'm where I lean towards i think that that what you said is very telling about becoming an appliance because psychologically speaking for those people who are in power, even now we are useful tools rather than human beings and that becomes where the priority of profit outweighs the priority of people.


Steve Prentice 1:20:45  

I completely agree. And I would say that, for me, again, My issue is not about how much technology becomes part of my physical self, as it is who owns that technology. And I think that did the democratization of the source of those power. And let's say the dilution of the source of those powers is the most valuable component. If there was one company that owned all the technology that did all this stuff, you know, let's say its name was schmegle, or something like that, they own everything. That would be scary. But if there are hundreds of companies around the world 1000s of companies creating technologies that I can choose from, then again, you dilute the the the power structure at the top, thus allowing maybe you'll have a choice in which technology is going to use which medicines and it may wish to use. One of the most, you know, sort of troubling things over the last few years has been, again, the the focus of how media has been channeled into particular opinion types, again, at the behest of certain individual media moguls, for example. I mean, you look at channels like Fox News and things like that, whether you like it or not, like if you love it, or you hate Fox News, the point is still we have a particular approach to delivering facts and news that is very, very centralized. And if you look back at the history of Fox and and all the companies that that are part of that same Empire, there's there's a mindset behind that. And they're not the only one. But if there is more access to more information, like we said, when we were talking about Google versus Twitter research and paper research, and so on, the more access you have to information, the more enlightened we are as individuals, the same thing with our choice of technologies, if there's more access to a different variety of technologies, then that power source gets diluted. And that's where I'd want to play some, my hope is that there isn't just one company that makes all the machinery that's going to turn me into a robot. But instead, I can choose the parts that I want, and evolve with that, again, a bit more to my own choice. But one interesting fact that I would want to add to this discussion, of course, is it when you look at dating services, I mean, you look at all the online dating services and matching services that are out there right now how many people have met and created relationships based on dating services, rather than going out in person to find somebody, the status statistics that I read, say that maybe 1/3 to one half of all children born now are basically a product of artificial intelligence, because the people who created those babies were matched up on dating services, which are AI based. So people are actually being born as now a result of AI and robotics. So that's, that's where you start, and you got to work from there. So I would suggest the democratization and the dilution of the power source at the top is what's going to be our saving grace, as opposed to, in my opinion, as opposed to not wanting to be roboticized, which I actually kind of welcome. But that's just my personal sentiment.


Ari Gronich 1:23:31  

Gotcha. And, and I'm just gonna let it go with with the last part of that, which would be Linux has typically been considered to be a better platform than Microsoft less buggy, more ability to to do more things. And yet, it's still not the respected platform worldwide as Microsoft is. And so that's where I'd say that quality does not necessarily create the quantity of usership. And it doesn't necessarily mean that that's what is going to be be utilized that the typically the best thing is the one that's least used, and more exclusive to, to get a hold of and learn. So that's just you know, again, difference in perspectives which I love having these difference of perspectives because now the audience has these two different places that they could go and, and I definitely like the idea of enhancing my physical prowess is and being able to, to put, you know, some like said some nano bytes in program I want to be a couple inches taller. I want to be, you know, a few pounds lighter. I want to make the muscles a little Bigger. All right, I program that in, and the nano bytes can can change my cellular tissue all they want to do that, but it's where they have influence over my mind that I guess I begin having even a bigger issue. And, and so you know, it's just an interesting place to discuss especially because your, your love is that collusion between technology and and people. So


Steve Prentice 1:25:32  

this one if I made you have a couple 160 seconds more for that Linux Microsoft comparison. Sure, I would agree Linux is a better system. But I'm wondering how many how many lives Linus Torvalds has saved. When I look at Bill Gates, who was you know, the very first really sort of mega billionaire of this industry. Obviously, he made his first millions by licensing Microsoft to IBM, rather than selling the software, right. So he was the profit margin was there from the beginning, create a great product, and not just simply sell it but license it to create what Microsoft became, once he became the richest person in the world, I mentioned, you know, is focusing on the Gates Foundation to save lives in Africa, for whom malaria and numerous others diseases, I'm not here to defend him, I'm just saying what an interesting turn of events, it happens to be that the profit margin that made Microsoft beat out Linux as the operating system of the world has turned around to become the source of saving, you know, millions, hundreds of millions of lives through his his foundation, which he didn't have to do didn't have to spend his money doing that.


Ari Gronich 1:26:38  

No, that's absolutely correct that he did do that. And I'm not going to get into what my stepdaughter might say about the Gates Foundation about Planned Parenthood and about the controversies that surround all of what he's doing and his purpose, because while I met him once on a television set in Los Angeles A long time ago, I didn't have a chance to have a conversation and confront him about the conspiracies that that he falls under. And, and I haven't had a chance to interview him about the things that he's said about things like population control. So I'm not going to get into a moral discussion about Bill Gates in his foundation and what he has either created or lack of created, just like I won't talk about the Clinton Foundation and what they've done or not done and, or, or any of those others at the moment. But the point is, is not is not that, but it's you know, whether the best quality is going to prevail, or the best salesman is going to prevail. prevail. And when it comes to something as serious as what we put into our bodies, and what can potentially be have control over our bodies and minds. I don't want this salesman to win, I don't want the good businessman to win, I want the best quality technology with the least negative side effects on you know, the population as possible. And so that's where I think, you know, I look for that moral control. And that, that place where how do we make sure that the bad players can't hack into the system that's now embedded in my brain, and tell me how to think and tell me what to do and make sure that regardless of if it's a small company, or a large company, or if it's 1000, large companies and small companies combined, that choose to, you know, take over or choose, you know, or somebody at the company, I don't like the company I'm being fired from. And so I'm going to hack into all the brains that that particular company who used to have that good reputation, you know, and so that's, that's where the, again, the fear comes with, with a wish and want for control, and still having that excitement about the possibilities of cool stuff that you know, can enhance our lives in those ways. So anywho


Unknown Speaker 1:29:30  

How


Ari Gronich 1:29:31  

can people get a hold of you, Steve, if they're interested in their company or them as individuals, bridging those gaps between technology and and the people?


Steve Prentice 1:29:44  

Well, I appreciate you giving me the opportunity to say that you can reach me at Steve prentice.com and it's just it's Steve Prentice.com and that's explains everything. In fact, you know what, just as a tail end to what you're saying there, right? Don't even give up my business card now, when I give out business cards is that that's all that's on there and no phone number, no fax number, no address. Nothing just simply just says Steve prentice.com. And people look at me kind of strangely and say, Is this it? This is your business card? I said, Yeah, everything you need to know about me is there. That's all you need. Awesome.


Ari Gronich 1:30:20  

Thank you so much, Steve. And, you know, this has been an interesting and eye opening conversation, I hope that you guys got a lot out of it. Because, you know, these are the these are the tough conversations that go along with morality and technology and systems and how we work with them. So that we can create a better world, not just more of the world that we have right now. So we want to create a new tomorrow. Today, we want to activate your vision for a better world. And remember to rate like, subscribe, review, comment below so we can continue on this conversation. And until then, I bid you really interesting dreams, thinking about technology, and your body combining. For now we are out. See you next time. Thank you for listening to this podcast. I appreciate all you do to create a new tomorrow for yourself and those around you. If you'd like to take this information further and are interested in joining a community of like minded people who are all passionate about activating their vision for a better world. Go to the website, create a new tomorrow.com and find out how you can be part of making a bigger difference. I have a gift for you just for checking it out and look forward to seeing you take the leap and joining our private paid mastermind community. Until then, see you on the next episode.

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Create a New TomorrowBy Ari Gronich

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